Best way to heat(secondary) a 12x12 bedroom?

[C(-)ris]

I have one bedroom in the house that is always significantly colder than the rest of the house. If it is 72 degrees in most rooms it is 68 in this room. I think this is mostly due to the fact that it is on the corner of the house with a lot of outside facing wall and it has 2 large windows. The windows are newer and seal very well, storm windows on the outside. They don't draft at all. We have tried adjusting the vents, but haven't had any luck getting enough hot air into the room. The house is on a single zone, and there is no way to make it dual zone without replacing everything.

So I have started to look at other options. It seems like the 2 choices are a ceramic baseboard heater or an oil filled radiator, both electric. Is either better than the other? I'd like to figure out what the most energy efficient way to heat the room would be. Only needs to be warm at night, no one spends time in there during the day.

[clay]

a blanket?

on a more serious note, I'm interested to see what's suggested here, as my wife and I are thinking about adding an additional heat source in a couple of rooms.

[AAA]

I like the oil-filled radiator type of heaters. I put a small fan behind them, and blow through the fins.

[lafinfil]

The oil filled heaters work great. The main downside is that it takes a while
for them to get up to temp - where the ceramic is fast.

Their upside is that they hold heat very well once they are at temp. You can get them with
a built in timer so you can preset when you want it to come on.

My bedroom is on the far end of the heating system, faces north, and has two windows.
Also I keep my temp at 60° pretty much around the clock. I kick on the heater about an
hour before bedtime (on low w/ thermostat at half setting)
If I pull the door shut the room is very comfy by bedtime. Big fan of the oil filled heater here.

[the_poochies]

AAA wrote:
I like the oil-filled radiator type of heaters. I put a small fan behind them, and blow through the fins.

They are cheap, movable and relatively safe. The biggest negative is that they use plenty of electricity. I use them to heat spaces 12x12 and as long as I keep the door to the room closed as to keep the warm air in, the room gets nice and toasty warm.

[cbelt3]

We have the same issue in our house. We did two things:

1- If it's a forced air system, you may wish to look at your ducts and check to make sure the system is balanced. Most forced air systems have adjustable vanes in the ducts that let you balance the system. In our house that improved things a bit.

2- For a bedroom, a manually operated oil filled radiator works well. The ceramic baseboard heaters function nicely, but are subject to being covered up with ejecta of the lifeform that lives in the room (read tossed clothing and whatnot). My son sometimes uses the fan trick described above, despite my explaining that he's heating a closed box, and it will get warm everywhere (but at the top first).

[Don Kiyoti]

Oil-filled radiator here too. A ceiling fan on low speed prevents the warm & cool air from stratifying. Be sure to set the fan to blow air up towards the ceiling.

[mattkime]

blankets.

[freeradical]

I actually shut the heat completely off and use blankets at night, but it doesn't get that cold in Sacramento.

[kj4btkljv]

Are the walls insulated adequately?

About 2 years ago I finally came to the conclusion that my kids bedroom was too cold in the winter, and poked into the wall. I found NO insulation in the cavity, none. We live in the Chicago suburbs, so winter here gets pretty cold. The next spring, after my discovery, we tore the drywall off the two outside walls (their room is on the back corner of the house), and sure enough, there wasn't anything in there at all. Took about two weeks of off-and-on work, but got the whole thing insulated. The last couple of winters have been completely different in that room.

Jeff